


Too Sober to Die, Dammit.

by SuitYourself



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Apocalypse averted, Fight Club - Freeform, Gen, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus being Klaus, Protective Ben Hargreeves, Sober Klaus Hargreeves, Tragedy, as per usual, ben being the best brother ever, just kidding, possibly aliens, post-episode: s01e10 the white violin, there's no aliens
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-02-09 16:09:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18641536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuitYourself/pseuds/SuitYourself
Summary: Klaus is chronically unlucky. It's about time that he accept that. Really waking up in a cage and being forced into a superhuman fight-club shouldn't be that surprising at this point. Well. It's kill or be killed, and for once, he'd really rather live, thank you very much.





	1. Chapter 1

Well. This sucked. Like, Klaus had been tortured for hours on end, fought in the Vietnam war, been haunted by hundreds of thousands of ghosts, lived through an apocalypse, and still, he could say with certainty, that this really, truly sucked.

All he’d wanted was a nice, healthy walk. That was it. He’d been trying so hard to be the sort of person who wouldn’t have this sort of shit happen to them, and yet here he was. In a cage. Literally in a cage.

He’d just wanted to clear his head. Get a few of the ghosties out and get some fresh air in the process. Have a smoke. Which, okay, would admittedly counteract the fresh air bit, but he didn’t really give a shit about fresh air, who was he kidding?

Then some men in black, like the sort you’d expect to come interrogate you about unpaid bills or grey-skinned alien babies ran up to him and…Well, he didn’t really remember anything else. Clearly, they must’ve knocked him out, but they were so damn quick and efficient that he couldn’t even venture a guess about how they did it.

And then he’d woke up here. In a cage. A fucking cage.

This sucked balls. Serious balls.

He could see through the thick metal bars to rows and rows of other barred cells, some with people shifting uneasily about, some empty. There was a toilet and a ratty frameless mattress in the cage with him. This dump was a hundred times worse than prison. And, of course, he would know. Plus, he hadn’t done anything to deserve this! Not that he could think of, anyway. He was clean. He was trying to be the sort of person he was _supposed_ to be, so why was he in a 6x8 cage like a naughty dog who’d chewed up one too many pairs of sneakers?

“This must be…maybe it’s related to Five? Or…Or do you owe anyone any money?”

Klaus numbly shook his head, watching Ben pace back and forth as much as he possibly could in the terribly limited amount of space they had been granted. Sure, Ben could probably phase right through the bars and book it, but Klaus knew that he wouldn’t. Knew that as long as he was a prisoner, Ben would opt to be one to. That’s just the way that his brother was.

“Well, the others will notice soon. They’ll come looking for you.”

“ _Right._ Just like they did when I was having that nice little slumber party with Hazel and Cha-Cha?”

Ben cast him an angry glare and shook his head. “Things are different now, Klaus. You know that they are. Back then…Well, you have to admit that it was natural for them to assume that you were out on some bender or something, but now they know better, because now _you’re_ better than all that and they know it.”

“Ah, I dunno, still think they’ll probably think I just fell off the wagon or something.”

“Even then, they’d look for you.”

“Ben, listen, I love them as much as the next Hargreeves, but I think you’re giving them a tad too much credit there…”

“And I don’t think you’re giving them enough.”

“Then we’ll disagree to…wait, I mean, agree to disagree. That’s the saying, right?”

Ben stopped his incessant pacing for the briefest of moments and spared a moment to smile fondly at his brother as he answered, with all the faux annoyance he could muster, “Yes, that’s the saying, Klaus.”

The echoey sound of metal whooshing through empty air interrupted them and Klaus hopped up from where he’d been perched on the mussy mattress to peek outside at the larger hellhole outside of his own private hellhole. There wasn’t anything too interesting going on. Just a young woman, about his age, kinda cute, tall, lean, brunette, sobbing her pretty little eyes out and being locked in a cage identical to his own.

He wished he could ask someone what the hell was going on, but he didn’t know who to ask. Or maybe, he was just too scared to ask, because he wasn’t too certain that he actually wanted to hear the answer. Why it was that all these people were being rounded up and locked away. What their captors were going to do with them. God knows he’s never been a coward, but the thought gave him shudders. The endless possibilities of what they could do to him. He simply wasn’t high enough to deal with shit like this.

“What is it?” Ben asked, gazing over his shoulder.

“Just some girl being locked up.”

“Was there one of those black-clad dudes with her?”

“Yeah.”

Ben sighed and ran his ethereal fingers through his ethereal hair. “Who the hell are they…” He muttered, seemingly more for his own ears than Klaus’s.

“I’ve been thinking…”

“No, Klaus. This isn’t related to aliens.”

“But, Ben! What about that one time when we were ten and I saw that weird green light in the sky that moved really, really fast, don’t you think that this could be that finally catching up with me? Like, they just figured out that I saw it and now they need to zap that memory from my brain or something?”

“There’s so many things wrong with that question…”

“You’re a ghost with monsters in your belly, are you seriously trying to tell me that you don’t believe in aliens?”

Ben sighed again and haphazardly shrugged his shoulders. “Fine, so maybe I _do_ sorta, kinda believe in aliens, but this still isn’t about aliens.”

Klaus pouted out his lip and flopped back down onto the sorry excuse for a bed. “Like you could possibly know that for certain.”

“I think…I think that what’s much more likely is that they know who you are and maybe…maybe they want like ransom money or something.”

“Then they really should’ve taken Vanya or Allison or something. They could get a shit load of money for either of those two. I’m totally worthless! You think Luther would let anyone fork out a penny for me? Doubtful.”

“Your pessimism has really reached a new height, Klaus. Wow.”

“You mean my realisticism.”

“Realism.”

“Right, realism.”

“And Luther _would_ pay a ransom for you, idiot. That or he’d just bust into the place…Okay, yeah, that’s probably more probable. Soon he’ll come charging in, everyone else on his tail, and they’ll all break you out of this place. I promise.”

Now it was Klaus’s turn to sigh. He was hungry, and tired, and thirsty as all hell. This was shit and there was no one coming to save him. Besides, the last time someone _had_ come to save him they had ended up dead, so he really wasn’t holding his breath. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” he halfheartedly grumbled, covering his face with his hands and taking in a deep, shaky breath.

No one was coming to save him. So, he’d just have to save himself.

He dropped his hands back down to his sides and slowly rose to his feet, resolve shaping itself into action. “Hey, Ben, do you think that if I manifest you, you could break these bars?”

Ben’s eyes widened, and a smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “Shit, why didn’t I think of that. Let’s give it a shot.”

Admittedly, Klaus hadn’t really done all that much “manifesting” since the big orchestra-crap there goes the moon-showdown. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, because there was pretty much nothing quite as awesome as seeing the joy on Ben’s face when he had finally been capable of being seen by the rest of their family, but it just took so much energy and concentration! And really, no one had ever accused Klaus of being a focused sort of person. Energetic, sure, he could do energetic, but the concentration part didn’t come so easy to him. Being sober was certainly helpful, but even when sober manifesting ghosts wasn’t at all easy. Really, it was a huge pain in his ass and for a time he had been certain that the only reason he had been able to do it in the full, big ol’ spectral reveal in the first place was because of the stressful, final countdown situation he had been in. But then he had finally managed to do it again and that had nixed that little theory.

Doing it now, on cue, though…Well, let’s just say it was going to be difficult.

Luckily, Ben understood that. “Klaus, concentrate.”

“What do you think I’m doing?”

“Honestly? You just like kind of constipated.”

Klaus glared at him for a moment, before surrendering to a sharp, reluctant burst of laughter. “Shut up and let me focus, Ben.”

“Shutting up and letting you focus, Klaus.”

“Thank you.”

So, that’s what he tried to do. _Focus. Focus. Concentrate. Focus. Manifest. Come on, manifest. Ben. Manifest Ben. Come on, come on! If you don’t do it, you’re going to be stuck in this cell for ever and you’re going to die! Die just when things were getting good._ _So, focus!_ _Focus, dammit!_

And he did. God, he really did.

And then, to his great surprise, it actually worked. One second, he was squinting his eyes, squeezing his nails into the palms of his hands, and biting at his bottom lip, and the next second, the room was full of translucent azure tentacles. Hell, yeah. Damn, was he proud of himself.

But that pride didn’t last. Not for so much as a minute, because he watched as the creatures within his dead brother threw themselves against the bars again and again and again and again, heavy thumps and bangs ringing out through the air as they uselessly slap, slap, slapped against the metal keeping him enclosed. All to no avail. The bars seemed to deflect Ben’s power, as though the tentacles weren’t even really hitting them, but were falling short, caught up in the air directly in front of them.

Like there was some sort of forcefield.

Shit, this was so fucking sci-fi that aliens were seeming more and more probable by the moment and if Ben didn’t agree, then that was his stupid problem, because Klaus could see it clearly. See himself lying on a table naked being probed and prodded, screaming through his own vivisection.

Finally, the sight of Ben tirelessly knocking at the forcefield over and over became too much for him to bare, his hopes dying a little more with each blow. He allowed Ben to shift into complete incorporeality with a frustrated grunt and shamefully moist eyes. “Shit,” he swore, curling his hands into fists and then flexing his fingers back out time and again. “Shit, shit, shit! They _do_ know about my power.”

“Yeah…they must…” Ben agreed, frowning at him, pity shining through his dark eyes.

“So, that’s it then, I’m screwed.”

* * *

 

**Hey! I’ll try to have the next chapter posted soon! It’s finals week at my college, though so it probably won’t be until after that. Why am I starting a fanfic on the night before the start of finals week? Um…I’m an idiot, maybe? Who knows.**

**Anyway, a big, huge thank you to anyone who read this thing. Any sort of feedback is always super appreciated.**

**-SuitYourself**


	2. Chapter 2

The first time they slid food beneath the bars of their cell, Ben convinced Klaus to strike up a conversation with the delivery man. Klaus figured that Ben was right, that the man would be as helpful as any in his journey to figuring out where the hell he was and why the hell he was wherever the hell he was. So, strike up he did.

“Hello, excuse me, Mr. Kidnapper, sir. O’ Captor, my Captor!”

The man rose up from where he’d been bent over, thrusting the food through its tiny opening and met Klaus’s eyes with a bemused expression. He had the largest eyes of any man Klaus had ever seen, they were somewhat hypnotic, and would’ve been attractive under less dire circumstances. “Yes?” he prompted, eyebrows raised and lips pursed.

Klaus breathed a hefty sigh of relief, glad that he wasn’t being altogether ignored as he had feared that he would be. “Yes…ummm, so what is this place? Why am I here?”

The man’s features morphed and his dazzling eyes glittered with ugly amusement. “To fight.” And then he left. He just left, leaving Klaus calling after him and helplessly gripping the bars in his hand as if he could tear them apart through sheer force-of-will and get himself an adequate answer to his question.

“Fight?” he whispered, glancing over his shoulder at where Ben was standing idly by.

His brother shrugged his shoulders, seeming awfully tired for a ghost.

“I can’t fight, I mean…My power’s useless in a fight unless I manifest you and that’s…”

“Nothing good will come from getting ahead of ourselves, let’s just wait and see. I think for now you should eat. You need strength.”

“I need strength for my pummeling?” Klaus muttered, even as he sat down on the mattress and grabbed the small tray of food so that he could place it atop his lap. He greedily gulped the water and took harried bites of stale bread in-between each elongated sip.

“God, slow down, Klaus, you’re giving me indigestion just watching you.”

Klaus didn’t bother with such formalities as swallowing before he said, mouth bursting with half-chewed bread, “I’m starving!”

“Well, I doubt a piece of hard bread will help too terribly much with that.”

“Sshh, no, don’t say such things. I’m trying to pretend that this is a pizza the size of this room.”

“And is that working?”

“No, because you ruined it for me.”

“I’m sure.”

Once Klaus drank the last drop of water in his glass, he slid the tray away from him and settled back against the bars behind him, eyes closed and breaths heavy. “Fight,” he whispered again, irritation and dread bundled up together in his tone. “Why didn’t they snag Luther if they wanted a fight? Or Diego? Or the boy wonder? Or hell, Vanya could kick all of our butts. I swear, Ben, they’ve got the wrong Hargreeves.”

“You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, I guess.”

“Aren’t I always?” Klaus sighed again, his eyes slowly blinking open to latch up with Ben’s.  “I mean, why can’t I ever be at the right place at the right time?”

“Because life sucks and then you die?”

Klaus snickered and nodded his head. “Yeah. And you would know.”

* * *

**********

Later that night, after all the lights in the cell block had been shut off, they came for him.

Half-asleep and drifting he was caught unawares by the sound of footsteps treading heavy in the hallway. Klaus’s heart buzzed with each footfall, as it brought a figure obscured by the dreary darkness closer and closer to his cage.

Ben was tense too, glancing back and forth between his brother and the reaper come to retrieve him.

The man paused outside of the cage, a looming figure in the low-light, towering above Klaus who was rubbing at his tired eyes and trying to prop himself up on the mattress. “Can I help you?” Klaus whispered, his voice hoarse and thirsty, the water he’d drank a fractured lifetime ago having streamed away to leave his throat parched and wanting.

“Come reach your arm out beneath the bars.”

Klaus wondered if he was even actually awake or if this was all just dream gibberish, because that’s sure what it sounded like. What would this man want with his arm?

Nonetheless, he complied, because really, what other choice did he have?

He scooted across the floor with all the coordination of a baby tortoise and clumsily thrust his arm through the opening that his food had been shoved through earlier that day. Ben was watching him with uneasy eyes, clearly wanting to say something, but refraining from doing so.

Klaus wasn’t sure what he expected, but he wasn’t too terribly surprised when he felt cold metal clamp down on his wrist. The bracelet was sharp and uncomfortable, like a busted handcuff that had lost its mate. He yanked his arm back and glanced back at Ben, head tilted in confusion, wondering what the purpose of this gawdy new jewelry was. But Ben wasn’t there. He wasn’t anywhere to be seen.

Klaus felt a panic set in unlike any he had ever felt before. Through everything, through every nightmarish experience that had come before this, Ben had been there. Through thin and thinner they had been together. But now, as the door to his cell was unlocked, and as he was forcefully tugged to his feet and pulled along down the listless hallway, he was alone. All alone.

“Ben!” he frantically called out, his heart pounding against his chest like it too was a prisoner desperately trying to make an escape. “Ben!”

The man, who was gripping his arm like his greatest goal in life was to stop its blood from circulating, glanced back at him, clearly wondering what the hell he was hollering about, but Klaus didn’t pay him any mind. He was quite accustomed to people thinking that he was insane and couldn’t care less about such things at this point.

He just wanted Ben back.

He didn’t leave him, right? That couldn’t be it…Ben wouldn’t just up and leave him. No way. Right?

His fellow prisoners began to stir as he screamed his lungs hollow for his missing dead brother. He felt a small spike of guilt for disrupting the minimalistic moment of peace they had been offered, but he couldn’t help it. He didn’t know where he was being taken, and without Ben by his side everything just seemed so much…starker. So much larger and so much more dizzying.

Here he was now, having to face the unknown alone, and he wanted no part of it.

Finally, after several moments of dreadful isolation, drunk on nerves, he was shoved into a skinnier hallway, this one brightly lit as those of a hospital, assaulting his eyes and dredging up memories he’d rather had left un-dredged. There was a thin line of blue paint on the floor providing a strong contrast to the pale tan tiles beneath his feet. He was standing on one side of the line, and his escort was standing on the other, still clutching his arm so that the limb was draped out between them as an unsteady tree branch shaking in the wind. The guard took a key out of one the deep pockets of his tailored black suit and swiftly used to it to swipe the bracelet from Klaus’s arm. Immediately after its removal, bars began to fall from the ceiling, and Klaus barely had time to reclaim his arm before the metal slammed down to meet the line of paint, forming a barrier between himself and the man in black.

The man began to walk away without a word and Klaus found himself almost wishing that he’d stay, if only so that he wouldn’t be completely alone in these unfamiliar surroundings he now found himself trapped within.

“Klaus! Klaus!”

He immediately spun around and, with an animalistic yip of delight, squealed out, “Benny, boy! You’re here!”

Ben’s features lit up as he eagerly nodded his head and inaudibly clapped his hands together. “Good, you can see me again. That bracelet thingy must’ve interfered with your powers or something.”

Klaus stared down at his now bare wrist, massaging it between his fingers. “Huh…and here I’ve been high for years in order to block out the ghosts when all I really needed was a hip new accessory…the more you know.”

A loud burst of whistling applause emanated from further down the hallway and the brothers’ eyes snapped to see what the ruckus was about. Hesitantly, Klaus took a step forward, Ben’s spectral feet mirroring his every step.

The hallway opened up into yet another cage, but this one was huge, much grander even than those used by the WWE for cage matches. As soon as Klaus stepped into the cage, another set of bars dropped down, blocking off the hallway behind him. Beyond the thin bars of the cage were throngs of people, some sitting, some standing, all with their eyes on him. So many people, watching him, leering at him, shouting at him. He wished he could run back to that tiny cell he had loathed with every fiber of his being mere minutes before. Anything was preferable to this. Sure, he loved being the center of attention, but not like this. This made him feel like a bug under a magnifying glass and it was making his skin burn and crawl.

“Wow…I’d always sorta figured I’d die alone in an alleyway somewhere…so this is pretty unexpected.” He gawked wide-eyed at the spectators who were so unabashedly gawking at him.

“You’re not going to die,” Ben hissed, seemingly just as transfixed by the multitudinous crowd as he was.

The people were dressed up nice. Dresses and suits. All black like a funeral. All black like _his_ funeral. And really, he figured that that’s what it would be soon enough.

“What do you care, anyway? If I died we could just move on to that big grey place in the sky with that little bicycle goddess who doesn’t much like me, it wouldn’t make much of a difference for you.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Ben sputtered, head cocked and confusion evident. “You know what, I don’t care…Klaus, being dead isn’t a party. It’s shitty and dull and there’s no glory in it. None at all. I don’t want this for you…So please, just…don’t give up now.”

Klaus couldn’t help but shoot his brother a weak smile as he whispered, “Awe, you do care.”

“Of course, I do, idiot.”

“That’s why you’re my favorite.”

Their conversation was halted by the buzz of a loudspeaker being turned on. Both Hargreeves’ gazes rose up to the ceiling, as though on a mission to identify the source of the sound.

A voice flooded through the speakers then. A voice that said: “And now! Our match of the night! Here stands a newcomer, the Ghost Whisperer! Who will be facing off against one of our reigning champs, the Dragon! As always, tonight’s fight is to the death, ladies and gentlemen, so the stakes are high for our fighters!”

“Oh my God,” Ben whispered, his eyes anxiously shifting back onto his brother. “Klaus…”

“The Ghost Whisperer? What kind of shitty superhero name is that? And I don’t even look anything like Jennifer Love Hewitt! Though, actually I’m a bit flattered…”

“Klaus,” Ben mumbled again, annoyed by his brother’s constant need to combat danger with levity.

Klaus looked over at his brother and shrugged. “What do you want me to say, Ben? I told you so? Death, here I come?”

 “Without further ado! Our champion!”

Klaus’s eyes drifted from his brother towards the other end of the cage, where a small, bird-eyed, bald man was standing. He seemed around his age, and if Klaus had to guess, he’d say that the man was exactly his age. To the day. October 1st 1989.

“The Dragon…Wonder what that means…”

“Let the match being!”

And then all hell broke loose. Weapons dropped down from the top of the cage with a hardy clang, and Klaus was left aimlessly staring at them, wondering if he should grab one, until a burst of fire came surging towards him.

“Ah, hot damn! So, that’s what it means!” He managed to jump out of the way right in the nick of time, but was left panting and panicked, his blood seeming to want to flow faster than his heart could work to pump it.

“Klaus! Manifest me! Now! Hurry!”

“No, Ben! I…You’d have to kill him and that’s…” God, he couldn’t imagine making his brother _murder_ someone for him. The thought turned his stomach.

“This is war, Klaus! He’s an enemy soldier and he’s trying to kill you. But you’re my brother in arms and I’m going to kill him first. Now manifest me, dammit!”

“But…But this guy, whoever he is…” Klaus’s speech was cut off by another bolt of fire. The flames were being blown out of the man’s gaping mouth, like he was a circus performer on steroids. “Shit, shit, shit!” The hem of Klaus’s vest sparked orange and he frantically patted it down with the palm of his hand, though it ached to touch it.

“He doesn’t seem to have any reservations about killing you!” Ben screamed, fear prominent and loud in his eyes.

Klaus had to admit that he had a point. A lot of them, actually. Yet, this man was just like him. A prisoner just trying to get out of this abyss alive.

He could hear the people behind him chanting over and over again, “Dragon, Dragon, Dragon!” And he knew that they were chanting for him to die. Chanting to see his blood spilled. Chanting to see his skin toasted and peeling.

No one was chanting for him.

No one except Ben, that is.

“Klaus! C’mon! Klaus!”

He glanced down to see his fists glowing blue and glanced back up to see his brother tinted the same color, tentacles out and rushing towards their opponent. The arena grew hushed with anticipation and Klaus closed his eyes as a loud, squelching sound reverberated through the fresh quiet. He opened his eyes to see the crushed, limp body of what had once been a man. He was far from squeamish, but the sight was enough to render any stomach unsteady.

Yet, the audience erupted into a raucous round of cheers, their excitement nearly tangible. Apparently, they didn’t give a single shit that the victor they had been rooting for seconds before was now dead at his feet. Apparently, he was their new golden boy. Their new monster.

All they’d wanted was a death, and a death they had gotten.

* * *

 

************

**Yeah, I posted sooner than I thought that I would, but here you go. Thanks again for reading and thank you for all the lovely comments, kudos, and bookmarks. The next chapter shouldn't take too terribly long to write, so expect that soon-ish.**

**As always, feedback of any kind is appreciated!**

  **-SuitYourself**


	3. Chapter 3

Klaus was back in his own cage, sweet cage, and he was glad for it. Ben was sat next to him on the mattress, both of them wordless and tired. Klaus wished he could rest his head on his brother’s shoulder, wished he could have a tangible arm around him to tell him that everything would be alright. But he knew, arm or no, that nothing was right.

“How many people are we going to have to kill for me to live?”

“I don’t know,” Ben answered honestly, staring down at his hands to avoid his brother’s heavy eyes. “But I’ll do it.”

“Ben…” Klaus hissed, half in disgusted disbelief, half in some sick sort of gratitude.

“You deserve to live as much as any of them, Klaus. I know you don’t think that you do, I know that you think you’re spoiled goods, but you’re not! You’ve been doing so good, Klaus, and I’m so proud of you. You deserve that fresh start you’ve been working for. You’ve earned it, and I’ll do anything to give it to you.” His voice was so stern, so full of determination, that Klaus couldn’t help but love him for it, misguided as his words may be.

“I don’t want you to do whatever it takes, Benji. My life isn’t your responsibility.”

“I didn’t say that it was. But listen…you may have a world around you, a world that can see you, a world you can help, but all that I have is you. The only impact I can have on the world is through you; the only way I can be of use is if I protect you. I don’t have a world, Klaus, all that I have is you, and I’m not about to sit back and let you die.”

“But I want to protect you too! Protect you from having to keep bloodying your hands for me! It’s not fair to you!”

“Shut up, it’s fine! We killed him in self-defense! It was kill or be killed and we chose! _I_ chose, and I don’t regret it, so shut up!”

Klaus sighed, shaking his head back and forth as he realized that his brother’s resolve was impenetrable.

They sat in silence for another beat before Klaus laid back on the bed, desperate to abandon himself to sleep. He closed his eyes, and he waited for blissful unconsciousness, but it never came. The night was spent in fitful tossing, the sound of death stuck in his ears like a catchy song, and the pressure of Ben’s eyes unwavering.

********

* * *

 

On what he figured was the sixth day he had been, for all intents and purposes, forgotten by the outside world, one of the cages right next to his finally got an occupant.

Klaus was woken by the incessant hiss of Ben calling his name, trying to rouse him from his fitful slumber. “What?” he moaned batting his eyes open, even as he slung his forearm over them to block the drilling beat of the fluorescent lights above him. The fact that the lights were on told him that he’d slept into the afternoon, but he didn’t much mind, given that there were so few ways that he could occupy his time. The boredom was starting to get to him. The empty time that left his mind full and downtrodden. He had too much of it, too much time for guilt, too much time for fears.

“Klaus!” Ben called again. Klaus sighed and dropped his arm away from his face and turned his head to see Ben pointing frantically at the cell to their right. “Look!”

So, Klaus sat up and looked. There was a body in his neighboring cage now, a solid form, unconscious and curled-in on itself. Klaus flopped onto his stomach, and army-crawled his way over to the bars separating him from the newbie. “He has kinda a nice ass, doesn’t ‘e?” Klaus asked, glancing back at Ben and grinning a bit.

“Oh, eww, God, Klaus, its Diego.”

Klaus’s eyes bulged before his features twisted into a grimace. “Let’s keep that ass thing between just us then, okay?”

“Who would I tell?”

“Good, solid point.” Klaus paused, his eyes drifting back onto his knife-happy brother. “Ugh, what is he doing here? Shit.”

“Must’ve been captured like you were.”

“But it’s Diego! He’s supposed to be like…paranoid and practical, not…Capable of being kidnapped, you know?”

Ben shrugged, walking towards the bars to gaze down on Diego’s sleeping form. “I guess they caught him by surprise.”

Diego’s spent body began to twitch, and Klaus sat up, legs crossed in front of him, fingers curled around the bars, to watch in rapt-attention. “I think he’s waking up!”

And sure enough, he was, he was waking up. It looked like it hurt him to open his eyes, but he did so, anyway, his gaze immediately falling onto Klaus. His features bent with perplexity and a soft moan escaped his lips before he whispered, voice soft and parched, “Klaus?”

“Hey, brother o’ mine, how ya feeling?”

“Like someone shot me with a tranq dart.”

“So…not too bad, then?”

Diego ignored him, just as Klaus had expected him to, and struggled to sit up, resting his forehead against the bars to give his tired, heavy head some support. “Where are we?”

Klaus, frowned, squeezing the bars until he could feel them leaving an indent in his palms. He’d been dreading this question. “Well…It’s a…um, a fight-club for people with superpowers.”

“Wait…let me get this straight, someone is kidnapping superheroes and forcing them to fight each other?”

“Right, exactly. Except no one here is doing anything especially heroic, so I’m not sure I’d say use the ‘h’ word.”

“Not the point, Klaus,” Diego muttered, playing at exasperation, but his features betrayed him as they quickly fell into soft creases and doughy eyes. “So, this is where you’ve been? I thought…I thought I’d never…”

“You thought that I’d fell off the wagon and died,” Klaus mumbled, easily supplying the words his brother had left unspoken, “Glad you all have so much faith in me.”

Diego sighed and clasped his hands over Klaus’s. “Maybe, maybe we did think you’d relapsed, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t have any faith in you, you stupid bastard. And it certainly doesn’t mean that we don’t care. We looked everywhere…I mean, hell, Klaus, I was looking for _you_ when these shitheads nabbed me.”

“Well that certainly doesn’t make me feel better…”

“I’m not saying that I blame you for me being here! God, I was trying to cheer you up!”

Klaus allowed a small grin to bend his lips at the corners. “I know, I know…Thank you.”                                                                       

Diego returned his smile for a moment before his expression quickly summersaulted into something heavy and dismal again. “Gotta say, though I’m happy to see you and all, I’d really rather you weren’t here.”

“You’re telling me,” Klaus moaned, squeezing the bars tight in his hands and gritting his teeth, with hopes of keeping his upset at bay. “I…Fucking hate the fact that you’re here, Diego.”

Diego dropped his hands away from Klaus’s, features hard and deep. “So, I’m guessing your stay here hasn’t been great.”

“Fair assumption.”

Diego studied his brother’s features, and Klaus was left wondering what it was that he was looking for. Maybe he wanted to see if he was changed at all since the last time they had seen each other. Klaus wondered if he would find any evidence that he had. He certainly felt changed. Monumentally so.

“Have you…um…have you had to fight anyone yet?” Diego asked, his voice far softer than it usually was. Far less brash and cocky, and far more sympathetic.

Klaus was reluctant to answer, feeling like if he did, he would be peeling back a layer of his skin and allowing his brother to see straight through to his squishy, vulnerable insides. Nonetheless, he offered a subtle nod of his head, as his gaze absentmindedly lowered to the ground, as if entranced by the floor tiles.  

Diego must’ve been able to tell that his brother wasn’t in the best of moods, that he was tired and beaten down, but nonetheless his curiosity forced him to keep his questions coming. “And…how was it? How did it go?”

Klaus shook his head, taking a deep breath and glancing over his shoulder at Ben, as though seeking his advice. “Just tell him the truth, Klaus,” Ben whispered, his eyes sad and full of unabashed pity, “He won’t judge you.”

But Klaus didn’t know if he had the guts to tell the truth. He didn’t know if he could bear to look his brother in the face and tell him that he had killed an innocent man. He had done a number of stupid, reckless things in his life, things that had made his siblings more than a little disappointed in him, but this…Simple, messy murder, it was a line he hadn’t crossed. A line he had never thought that he would cross. Sure, he had killed, plenty. More than most. But this didn’t feel the same. He didn’t feel worthy of Diego’s concern. At the moment, he wished he was a ghost like Ben just so that he could go unseen.

“It was…Well, the fights here are to the death, so…” He left the rest unspoken. A sentence full of heavy implications. It was all that he could manage at the moment.

He risked looking up. Risked meeting Diego’s deep, soulful eyes. And he could see that he knew. That they understood each other. That Ben had been right, and Diego wasn’t judging him. He still just seemed worried about him, and somehow, even such kind concern was a cause of pain for Klaus.

“I’m sorry…” Diego whispered, the words clumsy on his tongue, as if he were testing out the vocabulary of a foreign language. They were uncertain, but genuine. Sweet and vital.

“Thanks….” Klaus hissed, looking away as he found that he was incapable of holding to eyes that were so very crowded with such a vast myriad of emotions.

“I’m glad you won, though, Klaus.”

“Thanks,” Klaus whispered again, his tone soft, his voice hollow. He still wasn’t certain that he felt the same way. Part of him wondered why he had bothered winning. Part of him wondered why he had bothered to preserve a life he had spent so much time trying to throw away. But here he was all the same, so there must’ve been some reason he had fought. Some reason he had chosen to live. Perhaps it was just all due to Ben’s insistence. Or perhaps it was more.

The familiar sound of clomping footsteps filled his ears and out of the corners of his eyes he could see them. Those damn men in black suits. Those hell-spawns dressed up for dinner.

Every muscle in his body tensed as he waited for them to take him. To throw him back on the table and watch his life get gambled away. But his cell was not the one that they opened. He was not the one that they had come for; not this time.

He watched in horror as they began to drag Diego away from him. “No! Stop! He just got here! Take me! I’ll fight! Come on!” he screamed, standing up and throwing himself against the front bars of his cell. “Hey!” But the men ignored him, and, wordlessly, they stole his brother away.

“I’ll be fine, Klaus! Don’t worry!“ Diego called, before he was taken out of sight.

“No…” Klaus mumbled, slumping down onto the floor, his back being bit into by the bars behind him. He looked at Ben and bemusedly shook his head. “And here I thought things were bad before…God really must hate me, huh?”

 

* * *

 

**Hey, sorry this took so much longer to come out than I thought that it would! I got busy job-hunting and the like.**

**Thank you all for the support this fic has gotten so far. I really appreciate all the comments, kudos, and bookmarks. You guys are lovely.**

**Also, if any of you are part of The Umbrella Academy Amino feel free to reach out to me on there, my username is LuckyNumber. We could chat or RP or something, it'd be fun.**

**'Til next time~**

**Thank you for reading, and as always, any sort of feedback is appreciated!**


End file.
